Minister for Women, Senator Katy Gallagher was on the single parenting payment for a period in her twenties, after her fiancé died while she was pregnant with their child.
Gallagher, also Minister for Finance, recently told the ABC how she lived on the payment and that “it changed my life. It saved me.”
She described her personal experience, iterating that she “100 per cent understands” the importance of the policy and the support it offers.
Did this personal experience factor into the Albanese Government’s decision this week to raise the cut-off age for this payment from eight to 14 years?
I was asked a similar question in relation to Prime Minister Anthony Albanese, who often shares his story of being raised by a single mother in housing commission.
“I know first-hand what it’s like to grow up with a single mum doing it tough, and we want to make sure that the children of single-parent families have the best opportunities in life, to go on and to fulfil, to aspire to, a good life with good jobs, with security.”
What influence does Albanese’s personal experience therefore, have on these decisions?
Policy change like this undoubtedly stems from a wide range of factors, it’s true. This includes extensive lobbying from people like Anne Summers, whose groundbreaking research last year showed that 60 per cent of single mothers report past abuse and face impossible choices between financial security and their own safety. As well as advocacy efforts of people like Terese Edwards, the chief executive of Single Mother Families Australia.
Raising the cutoff age was also a leading recommendation that came together from a cohort of experts for the Albanese Government-appointed Women’s Economic Equality Taskforce, led by Chair Sam Mostyn.
But the personal experiences of politicians must surely factor in — not only in swaying them to stand behind policy shifts but enabling them to truly empathise with those affected by the decisions they are making. And, more importantly, in being able to communicate their previous experience.
These personal experiences again offer excellent reminders of why we need diverse representation in politics– people from all different backgrounds and experiences: Katy Gallagher’s journey as a single mother. Linda Burney’s remarkable life which, as one profiler recently remarked, has “brought her to this point in history”. There is Senator Fatima Payman, still in her twenties, who became the first hijab-wearing politician in the Australian parliament in 2022 and brings her experience of being the daughter of a refugee from Afghanistan, as well as that critical factor of youth.
Outside of the Federal parliament, there is diversity of experience that comes to state and territory politics. One great example is the leader of the ACT Liberal Party Elizabeth Lee, who has become what is believed to be the first party leader to have a baby during her term.
Yesterday, she retweeted a scene from a frosty playground in Canberra. Last week she tweeted a comment about being in those early weeks of the newborn haze, “When you’re 3 weeks postpartum and your first-born toddler points at your mummy-tummy and asks if there’s ‘another sister’ in there…”
Lee’s not only managing a newborn with a big career, she’s blazing a new trail.
Sharing her story with Pathyway to Politics, she noted how “inaccessible public life and politics has been for working mums, so if I can set a good example and set a precedent, that’s a good thing.”
These personal experiences are important, but more so is the willingness to share them. A human side, that brings the personal to politics and the experiences of the community into policymaking. This human side then sees a shift in language.
In this case, the shift in language has been one which highlights the value we place on these parents, as well as the investments we’re willing to make in supporting them now, and into the future.